The LAFC Foundation and soccer star Clarence Seedorf’s Champions for Children foundation announced that they will pursue joint projects worldwide. The non-profit organizations will build soccer-based community centers in underserved areas. These facilities will give children and teens more opportunities to participate in physical activity. They will also draw families to important social, academic and healthcare resources.

The LAFC Foundation and Champions for Children will raise money together for these projects. The groups have used similar models to pursue their goal of helping communities achieve better health and education. The LAFC Foundation has constructed soccer fields, and provided uniforms, equipment and coaching in Kenya and near its Los Angeles-area base, and is currently developing similar projects in South Africa and Ethiopia. The organization works with universities, and widely respected community and nonprofit groups on many of its initiatives. Seedorf’s organization builds schools and sports-focused, community centers. In its first project, Champions for Children created a community center in Almere, the Netherlands, a low-income area to the country’s north. Seedorf’s family moved to Almere from their native Suriname when he was a boy. The center includes a turf soccer field, basketball, tennis and badminton courts.

Seedorf plays for the Italian Series – A club AC Milan and is one of the world’s best-known soccer players. But he also has a reputation as a humanitarian interested in helping inner city and third world communities. “Together, the LAFC and Champions for Children foundations will become a more powerful, socially responsible force,” said Don Sheppard, the founder and President of the LAFC Foundation. “Both organizations believe strongly that we will complement each other’s work in helping underserved communities globally. We intend on building centers that will be the starting point for youth to live healthier, better lives.”